UCL Laws PhD candidate representing wronged Subpostmasters in ongoing Post Office Inquiry

The UK Post Office Inquiry is currently ongoing, looking into how computer error, corporate incompetence and potentially problematic lawyering led to hundreds of Subpostmasters being falsely accused, and in some circumstances, convicted, of criminal offences.

UCL Laws PhD candidate Flora Page, who is also a barrister at 23 Essex Street Chambers, recently represented former Subpostmistress Kathleen Crane who had her Post Office conviction quashed on the Ground that it was an "affront to the public conscience”, which happens rarely and only in the most egregious cases of prosecutorial misconduct.

Mrs Crane’s case followed the original Post Office appeal, Hamilton & Others v Post Office, in which Flora acted for three appellants, Seema Misra, Janet Skinner and Tracy Felstead. She was led by Paul Marshall, and instructed by Nick Gould of Aria Grace Solicitors. These three brave women made it possible for subsequent appeals like Mrs Crane’s to succeed on this rare Ground. 

 The Post Office had conceded their appeals on the much narrower Ground that it had not been possible for them to receive a fair trial, but it argued that the second more significant Ground of appeal did not apply. Originally Flora’s clients were the only three who decided to fight the Post Office on this. Ultimately, the Court of Appeal decided the issue in their favour, on the basis that the Post Office’s failure to disclose what it knew about the Horizon system had effectively reversed the burden of proof, requiring Postmasters to prove that they were innocent, while simultaneously denying them the information they needed to try to discharge that wrongly reversed burden. This was, it decided, an “affront to the public conscience”.

Not long after the Court of Appeal made that decision, the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry was put on to a statutory footing. Flora was instructed by her original three clients to represent them within it, and since then a further nine have joined in. She is led by Edward Henry KC and instructed by Mike Schwarz of Hodge Jones & Allen Solicitors.

Mrs Crane's was the first appeal to be heard after the Government announced its plan to introduce legislation to quash the convictions of all those convicted on the basis of Post Office evidence. The Court of Appeal heard and granted Mrs Crane’s appeal within two weeks of receiving her application, demonstrating that there is no need to await legislation. Any Subpostmaster who has a conviction based on Post Office evidence can speak to a lawyer about appealing it at any time.

See an example of Flora’s cross-examination.

Read more on how members of UCL Laws are involved in the Post Office Inquiry